Stay on target

You know, when you have a TV show about superheroes (and villains) on a time-travelling spaceship, a time loop episode is pretty much inevitable. It’s been done so many times in so many TV shows, it borders on cliche. But this is where Legends of Tomorrow can really shine. When it goes to a stock storyline like this, it can really focus on building its characters. And when the main players are as strong as these, a character-focused episode can turn into something really fun and interesting. That’s what happened last night.

We open with Zari trying to divert the ship’s power to run a complicated simulation to find loopholes that will allow her to change history. Gideon warns her that it’s a bad idea and spoilers, it turns out the ship’s right. As soon as the Legends return from their mission, which apparently involved Napoleon and a disco band (now I want to see that episode), Gideon crashes. The ship is broken, and after a tense exchange with Sara over who’s in charge, Zari goes to fix the ship. She gets some green goo on her face, the ship explodes and everyone dies. She suddenly finds herself back in the middle of the argument with Sara and sets about trying to figure out what’s going on. Someone in the writers’ room just watched a ton of Star Trek: The Next Generation, huh?

This is Zari’s episode to shine, and she immediately recognizes what’s happening. She tries to warn the rest of the Legends, but keeps ending up in the med bay and sedated. Unable to warn anyone or investigate the explosion, the ship blows up and the time loop is reset until Zari builds up a tolerance to the sedative. Nate, since he’s the only superhero aware that pop culture exists, is the one who helps Zari figure out exactly what’s going on. He tells her to say “Groundhog Day” on the next go-around, and he immediately believes that there’s a time loop, and sets about trying to fix it. Nate’s movie references are usually only good for a quick laugh (or more often, groan), so it’s nice to see it actually come in useful for once. Together, they figure out that her causing Gideon to malfunction isn’t causing the ship to explode. Somebody is making it happen. The only question is who? Well, that’s going to have to wait until the next loop. Nate and Amaya still can’t keep their hands on each other, and it’s adorable as it is awkward. Especially because, going by their… sounds… Nate turns into Steel, um, during. Huh. Fortunately for Zari, and all of us watching, the ship explodes and time is reset.

The episode mines a ton of comedy from this premise, much like the Bill Murray movie they keep referencing. Say, when this was written, do you think they intended it to air closer to actual Groundhog Day? Eh, oh well, it’s a time travel show. It’s Groundhog Day somewhere. They notice Rory’s hiding something, and after a rapid fire sequence of Nate setting off traps and Zari disarming them the next time, all they find is the beginnings of an erotic novel. God, Rory’s the best character. He needs more screen time. Next step is Sara, who opened herself to Mallus last episode. With the help of Ray, who’s first thought is “Cause and Effect,” rather than Groundhog Day (THANK YOU!!!), Zari shrinks down to spy on Sara. But all Sara’s doing is calling Agent Sharpe to say hey. God, this awkward mutual crush is so cute. This vulnerability and uncertainty is a side of Sara we’ve never seen before. Usually, she’s confident and sure, going after anything and anyone that strikes her fancy, and throwing them aside when she’s done. It’s cool to see her get a slow burn romance like this. She also mentions how important she thinks Zari is to the team.

At this point, a theme to the episode is emerging. It’s not just about a time loop. This is the episode where Zari really becomes a member of the team. Ever since she was introduced, her stay on the Waverider has felt temporary. She’s only here until her problems get solved, and nobody’s trying to steal her totem. She has no desire to fix anachronisms, and no real connection to the rest of the Legends. This is where she learns that she actually has friends aboard this ship. That the other Legends consider her a teammate, and are willing to listen and help when she has a problem. It’s a big episode for Zari. It’s about time she became a real part of the team, and it’s fitting that the show initiates her in such a funny, self-referential and surprisingly heartfelt way.

Even friendship and a consequence-free fun montage can’t make the one-hour time loop any less soul crushing eventually, though. She quickly gets to the tired, depressed, suicidal Bill Murray stage of the movie and starts feeling hopeless and dejected. That’s when she gets the biggest indication that she’s really part of the team. She tells Sara about what’s been going on, and Sara’s first instinct is to believe her and help. No questions asked. It’s a small moment, but you can see how much it means for the team. Even a show as big and silly as Legends of Tomorrow can have these well-executed, subtly-acted emotional beats sometimes. Once all the Legends start working together, it doesn’t take long to find out what’s going on. Agent Sharpe’s assistant Gary noticed that the Waverider explodes, and tried to save them with a device that creates a Time Loop… which Rory destroys, thinking it’s the bomb. They now have five minutes to find and disarm the bomb. Fortunately, they’re able to narrow it down to one place: inside the eight-track tape they brought back from the last mission.

With seconds to go and no way to dispose of the bomb, Zari gives every member a heartfelt message. She then locks herself behind a force field, creates a tornado to contain the blast, and prepares for a heroic sacrifice… which turns out to be a simulation run by Gideon. Yes, this wasn’t just a “Cause and Effect” style time loop episode. It’s a holodeck episode! Kind of. It turns out when she got that green goo on her face at the beginning, it almost killed her. It’s the fluid the ship uses to travel through time, and when it happened, Gideon transferred Zari’s consciousness into her matrix. Zari’s simulation worked, and revealed to Gideon that Zari would need a team if she ever wanted to get her brother back.

This wasn’t the most original episode of Legends of Tomorrow. It borrowed heavily from both the movie and the Star Trek episode it referenced. But it knew that. It wasn’t trying to be original or novel, it was just having fun with established sci-fi tropes. As Nate himself said, it’s about time they did one of these. What was novel is how the show used these plot devices. As much as I love the wild, ridiculous anachronism storylines this show gives us, Legends of Tomorrow is at its best when it focuses on its characters. What drew us to the show in the first place is that it put all these strong superheroes and villains together on a cramped ship and forced them to work with each other. That’s where the show’s most effective comedy and drama come from, and both were in fine form here. So how do they top this next week? Who knows, but this episode does end with Rip Hunter contacting Wally West. That’s a good start. The Arrowverse has gone too long without any sign of Kid Flash.’